Michael Leunig is known as a cartoonist, philosopher, poet and artist. His commentary on political, cultural and emotional life spans thirty-five years and has often explored the idea of an innocent and sacred personal world. He describes his approach as regressive, messy and vaudevillian - producing work which is both raw and sublime, loved and hated. His themes and images have been widely used and adapted in the realms of music, theatre, therapy, religious life and spirituality .

Leunig was born in East Melbourne in 1945, a slaughterman's son and the second eldest of five children. He was educated at various state schools, kitchen tables, paddocks, rubbish tips, loopholes and abattoirs in Melbourne's industrial Western suburbs. Enid Blyton, Arthur Mee, Salinger, Milligan and The Beatles were early creative influences and his political consciousness intensified radically upon reading his notice of military conscription sent to him from the Australian government in 1965.

He fled from formal education and pursued a successful career as a factory labourer and meatworker where he nurtured his art and philosophy before beginning work as a daily newspaper cartoonist in Melbourne in 1969. The Penguin Leunig, his first book of collected cartoons, was published in 1974 and since then he has produced twenty more collections including books of poetry and prayer. His prints, paintings and drawings have been exhibited broadly and are held in various public and private collections. Leunig's public appearances have included on-stage conversations with people ranging from the Archbishop of Canterbury to an Indonesian President, as well as painting and poetry performances at the Sydney Opera House accompanied by the Australian Chamber Orchestra. The artist provided the images and verse for the Orchestra's 2000 production of the Carnival of the Animals. In 2001 he wrote songs and lyrical poetry with Neil Finn, Brett Dean and Richard Tognetti for the ACO's production of Parables, Lullabies and Secrets and developed a series of short clay figure animations for SBS Television. Leunig's various collaborations and journeys with indigenous painters from remote communities in northern and central Australia have greatly influenced his art, humour and philosophy.

In 1999 he was declared a national living treasure by the National Trust and awarded honorary degrees from La Trobe and Griffith Universities for his unique contribution to Australian culture. His work appears regularly in the Melbourne Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.

He is a father of four and lives on a farm in northeast Victoria with his second wife, Helga, their two children, a vast number of kangaroos, a tiny vineyard, various spiders, scorpions and snakes, a little olive grove and three small dogs.